As mentioned in my previous post, it is important to be precise when defining Modernity. For the purposes of this post, Modernity can be considered along two dimensions:
1) In one dimension there is material/tecnological modernity which I defined as the material conditions that make up the modern world and which are responsible for the qualitative change from agrarian life. Things, like the telephone, the various types of engines, railroads, refrigeration etc are material entities which profoundly altered the way we live regardless of any change in morality or philosophy.
These devices also led to profound social and institutional changes which would have been impossible without their presence. For example, it's hard to think of the possibility of the modern multinational corporation without the easy availability of telecommunications, which forms the bedrock of the organisation's ability co-ordinate actions.
2) The second dimension is cultural or philosophical modernity. It's distinguishing feature is the rejection of the Christian vision which, until the mid 20th C, had cultural hegemony over the West. The key modes of rejection was either explicit rejection of Christianity as in atheism or a "functional" rejection of traditional Christianity through negation of traditional interpretations of biblical texts.
This division is important to emphasise since it is commonly assumed that agrarian type societies are by their nature "traditional". This I believe is a mistake since the lack of technological sophistication is no obstacle to moral innovation. The French Revolution, for instance, implemented many modern ideas well before the age of steam. Rome's later stage sexual morality was similar to our own despite the lack of refrigeration.
This is why it's important to distinguish between technological modernity and philosophical and not conflate the two.
It's also this blog's contention that the modern world was Christian until the mid 20th C. and that much of the modern material/technological development occurred within a Christian, predominantly Protestant context. Sure, some of the foundational ideas arose within the Catholic world, but it's not enough to originate an idea, it also needs to be effectively implemented. And it was the Protestant world which provided the superior cultural infrastructure in which technological modernity thrived. Not only did Protestantism encourage the development of material/technological modernity, it also modulated its expression through its moral principles.
Take a trivial example. Quite soon after photography was developed it's potential to capture the erotic image was realised. The printing press and the surrounding newspaper infrastructure would have made the widespread dissemination of porn quite feasible--and it's fascinating to speculate what a 19th C version of Playboy or Hustler would of been like-- yet it did not happen due to a cultural environment which saw it as a threat and thereby severe limited its expression. Contraception and abortion were also technologically feasible yet severely restricted due to the prevailing moral norms. Even in the area of cryptography, moral issues modulated the extent of its implementation.
Furthermore, the civic institutions that these societies built were models of trust, efficiency and honesty, at least when compared to the rest of the world. Leaders were held accountable and were meant to be honorable. Now, of course there were exceptions to the rule, sometimes widespread, but compared to the rest, the Protestant world was in a different league. Good governance, wealth and technological advancement were the markers of it. Contemporary writers were also aware of it and the unique position the Protestant world had found itself in in the late 19th C. Much of the opposition to immigrant migration at that time was a based up a fear of corruption of the system by cultures which did not share its values.
One of the distinguishing features of modernity is the rise of the
bourgeoisie. They were the managerial class which bought the practical
skills which enabled modernity. Much is made of the elite, but it is the
middle, particularly the upper middle where the cultural "center of
gravity" lies. It's the senior lawyers, doctors, economists,
journalists, bankers, engineers, etc, that set the moral tone of the
professions. The Protestant world was able to produce a large, well
qualified, honest and technically able group of senior bourgoisie who
were the "managers" of modernity, and it was their cultural values which
shaped it. In the U.S. this bourgeois group by and large
belonged to the "Mainline" religions but similar "mainline" faiths were
in operation in other parts of the Protestant world. These mainline faiths provided moral instruction particularly to the bourgeois who ensured that the commence, law, science, medicine,etc operated with their moral limits.
The "health" of modernity is in many ways then a reflection of the health of Protestantism and this is why the collapse of " traditional" Protestantism has been the greatest western calamity of the 20th Century. The bottom line is that that Christian guardians of Modernity are no longer there. It is the corruption of these particularly Mainline strands of Protestantism--to which the senior bourgeois belonged-- which is the mechanism by which the modern world became de-Christianised: Christianity meaning Christianity in a "traditional" sense. As Mainline Protestantism de-Christianised so did the upper managerial classes, who took their moral instruction from it.
It's beyond the scope of this post to elaborate on the mechanics of de-Christianisation, but as Buckley noted at his time in Yale the process was in full swing. Chesterton noted similar changes in England in the 1920's . And what do I mean by de-Christianised? Most of the readers of this blog
will intuitively grasp at what I'm getting at but to formally define it
is much more difficult as one of the core problems of Protestantism is inability to
self-police its limits. Protestant expression is protean. However if one take the position of sola scriptura, then readings of scripture which broadly deny its everyday textual meaning can be taken as being unsound. A Christianity which can
theologically align Christian approval with the concept of "Gay
Marriage" or other modern "innovations" is a false Christianity.
If anyone wants to understand why our institutions are becoming more
corrupt and left leaning it is because the space occupied by "sound Protestantism" in the governing and administrative bourgeois class has been filled by either it's pseudo-Christian variants or by outright atheism. The number of "sound Protestants" in the appropriate administrative positions simply aren't there to push back.
I don't want to talk about the Catholic relationship to modernity here, except to say that Catholicism could not, and still cannot engage modernity effectively despite being an originator of it's founding principles. The institutional changes bought about by the Reformation, in my mind, crippled it's ability to engage modernity in a commanding manner. While Eastern Orthodoxy is incapable of engaging modernity at all.
P.S. These are two pictures I took on my trip to the U.S. several years ago.
37 comments:
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In the US all the mainline protestant churches are extremely liberal, as are reform and conservative Jews (liturgically conservative but have female rabbis, etc.) Evangelical Protestantism, however, is associated with the South and Midwest--flyover country. People on the Coasts who become Evangelicals tend to be relatively lower class. Those in elite professions or living on the Coasts who have conservative religious beliefs tend to be Catholic or Orthodox Jews, and a it seems to be fairly common for upper-middle class conservatives who find religion to become Catholic, see Sen. JD Vance and Sohrab Ahamri for example. Catholicism seems to have a foot in both the working class and elite camps, while Evangelicalism is strikes people as a working class thing.
Relatedly, most of the major intellectuals in the US conservative movement seem to be Catholic or Jewish. By the middle of the 20th century, a large majority of whites in the New York area were either Jews or from historically Catholic ethnic groups, and NYC is of course the cultural and intellectual hub of the country. An upper class WASP who finds religion in that context is probably going to become Catholic, unless they marry into an Orthodox Jewish family like Ivanka Trump did. They are not joining a mega church.
Modernity is a moving target. It is drifting constantly, because it is the progressive implementation of its insane premises, which are freedom, equality and relativism. These premises were born in Protestantism, where they were called Sola Fide, universal priesthood and Sola Scriptura, respectively.
No wonder Protestantism mixed well with modernity: they have the same basic concepts. Modernity is the secularization of Protestantism.
But, as modenity was innovating more and more while trying to implement freedom, equality and relativism, it was a matter of time that Modernity started adopting principles that were incompatible with Christianity, such as gay marriage. Then, it was time to decide.
Since the America state was founded on modernity over a Christian population, the good jobs demanded to be faithful to the official ideology, that is, modernity. Upper middle class did that and discarded Christianity.
What was the alternative? I dared to say that some progressive initiative in my job was not a good idea bwcause I wanted to be faithful to God and I am now unemployed. See how it works?
"Modernity is the secularization of Protestantism"
It would be more accurate to say that Protestantism is the first form of Modernity. As Modernity drifted away from Christianity, there was a first form, which were the first Protestant churches, such as the Luteran Church. The second wave was the Puritan churches, which increased equality, because there were no bishops, etc . The third step was the Enlightenment, as implemented by the Founding Fathers. Then the social gospel, socialdemocracy, political correctness and wokeness.
Each step is more and more freedom and equality and less Christianity. While Modernity was compatible with Protestant Christianity, there was cross-polinization between both. But in fact, America had been founded on modernity and Christianity was subordinate. It only thrived while it was compatible with modernity.
Equality and the rest of the package isn't inherently protestant. They were imported in. Not native.
On the topic of modern Protestantism in the United States, a few things. First, yes there is absolutely a trend towards Catholicism among intellectual Protestants (I used to joke, perhaps uncharitably, that whenever you met a biblically literate Catholic he used to be Protestant). Interestingly enough there’s also a trend towards Calvinism. I suspect is that these are two forms of Christianity closest to hand that have a real place for intellectuals. That being said there are definitely evangelical Christian intellectuals and especially on a regional basis, elites (the Baptist church is borderline the state church of Texas and includes legitimate billionaires in its membership).
We also have to describe some things as “mainline” because they aren’t “mainstream” Protestantism by the numbers. Liberal denominations bleed membership like crazy. I also wouldn’t get too regional in my analysis. Evangelicalism may be strongest in the “Bible Belt” of the south, Midwest, and much of the west, but it is still present in much of the “liberal” parts of the country, it’s just percentages. Finding not just an evangelical church in NYC and LA, evangelical colleges isn’t exactly hard. Even the putatively Catholic Hispanic population of the United States has a strong evangelical presence.
Also circling back to the anti-intellectual component of evangelicalism, some of that is overblown. The evangelicals are insecure about their intellectual firepower so they’ve been on a college founding spree for over a century. Same way Germany at the time of the reformation had built and maintained a massive university structure because of insecurities about being the “barbarians” of Christendom, having never really been under Roman rule.
It's pretty rich for a Catholic, of all people, to accuse Protestantism of being unable to maintain doctrine when the Pope is literally changing Catholic moral teaching in real time. Goodbye death penalty, hello legalized homosexuality. Your supposed stability is an illusion maintained by historical revisionism - your church has always been like it is today.
@Anon
Evangelical Protestantism, however, is associated with the South and Midwest--flyover country. People on the Coasts who become Evangelicals tend to be relatively lower class.
I find the relationship of class and Protestantism very interesting and I think in many ways it represents the differentiation in how one approaches religion i.e. you either a "thinker" or a "feeler". I think that the upper classes are more cognitively orientated and hence want an intellectually more rigorous religion, whereas "lower class" people tend to "feel" their religion. Note, I'm not disparaging either group.
One of the interesting complaints of the Nouvelle Theologians was that scholasticism stripped all the "feeling" away from religion and as a result, Catholicism was dying.
I'm partially on board with this. The Traditional Catholic solution to this problem was the "Opera" of Catholicism, statuary, costumes, smoke and ceremony but a lot of this was destroyed following V2. Evangelicalism is the Protestant take on this and seems to cater for the Protestant demographic that receives it Grace through the "feels". And note, we need to recognise that the primary aim of Christianity is to become Christian, not a lover or a philosopher. If God should choose to call men through their feelings rather than their thoughts, who am I to disparage Him?
@sayingthetruthisoffensive
Modernity is a moving target
I presume you mean philosophical modernity?
The core problem of Protestantism is its intellectual instability hence it inability to maintain cohesion. But remember, instability goes both ways. Protestantism has an ability to become more rigorous and more lax.
"Modernity is the secularization of Protestantism."
How is a Baptist fundamentalist a "modern"? And what does the secularisation of Catholicism look like. Looking at some of the Pew Research figures in the U.S. the Catholics aren't exactly pushing back the secular tide. Catholic membership hasn't made Joe Biden a paragon of traditionalism. The lion's share of "conservative pushback" is being done by the Evangelicals.
The key issue is the relationship of faith to Grace. And it's my opinion that certain strands of Protestantism are Graced. Mainline Protestantism isn't. (It may have been at one time.)
@Anon
It's pretty rich for a Catholic, of all people, to accuse Protestantism of being unable to maintain doctrine when the Pope is literally changing Catholic moral teaching in real time.
Reddit tier quality comment. You clearly haven't been around here long. Observing the collapse of Protestantism, something Protestant scholars have acknowledged themselves, is not cheer-leading for Catholicism.
Calling me “reddit” doesn’t undermine the observable fact that Catholicism is empirically proving itself to be just as completely unable to maintain any coherent doctrinal consistency as the worst Protestants ever were. All you need is one man with a will to change your faith and you’re out of luck. It’s almost like Orthodoxy was right all along.
@ Hoyos
Interestingly enough there’s also a trend towards Calvinism.
Yes, I think there is a "reactionary" response to the overt liberalism in all of the faiths. The situation in the U.S. really reminds me of France in the 1930's. I think some of the theological innovations in the more liberal Church's are pushing the disgust button and people are responding in kind in the opposite direction.
That being said there are definitely evangelical Christian intellectuals
I imagine there are but there should be more. Mark Noll, an evangelical, stirred a bit of controversy a few years ago when he published the scandal of the Evangelical Mind
https://www.eerdmans.com/Products/8204/the-scandal-of-the-evangelical-mind.aspx
His assertion was that there wasn't much of an evangelical mind. ( He's saying it, not me.) But here's the thing. Intellectualism can deepen the faith but on the other hand its very easily susceptible to sophism and intellectual corruption. I think that this is where the mainline faiths went wrong. Modern biblical criticism, Darwinism and whatever intellectual trends were current were fused, to produce syncretic variants of the original protestant denomination, especially among believers who lacked the serious intellectual firepower to refute some of the modernist nonsense. On the other hand, those with "simple faiths" were immune to this.
I am sayingthetruthisoffensive
"Modernity is a moving target"
I presume you mean philosophical modernity?
Well, I meant philosophical modernity, yes. Jefferson and the woke belong to philosophical modernity, but they don't have the same ideas. Philosophical modernity is the locigal development of the ideas of freedom, equality and relativism. In this aspect, the woke are more coherent the Jefferson. Jefferson said that all men were equal while having slaves. The fact is that equality is absurd and its logical development brings new levels of absurdity.
But, of course, technological modernity is also constantly changing, no doubt about it.
In fact, I don't see "philosophical modernity" as a good term. I prefer to speak about "liberalism", "progressivism" or "the Enlightenment religion/ideology". Modernity comes from modern, which is only a term that means "recent things". This is too vague and not accurate enough. Scholasticism was modern in the 13th century and, today, there are modern societies that have nothing to do with liberalism (say, tribes in Afghanistan.
In fact, modernity is a term which have the myth of progress embedded in it. If someone opposes it, it is against modernity (meaning: "it is against progress, he wants to return to the Stone Age"). I prefer to use a neutral term.
For "technological modernity", I prefer to use "technological progress". I don't believe in the myth of progress, with exception of technology, where progress is obvious.
The core problem of Protestantism is its intellectual instability hence it inability to maintain cohesion. But remember, instability goes both ways. Protestantism has an ability to become more rigorous and more lax.
Yes, Sola Scriptura gives Protestantism its instability. So it COULD become more rigorous and more lax. But, in the long term, Protestantism has the tendency to get more lax. Why?
Because Protestantism does not live in a vacuum. There are forces that go in a direction of making the human society more lax:
- Entropy, which favors a more lax environment. A rigorous society is a state of low entropy so it needs effort to maintain. A lax society does not require any effort. The same way you need effort in the winter to heat your cold home but you don't need effort for your hot home to get cold. Second law of thermodynamics.
- Human instincts, which are programmed for the Paleolithic and try to return to the Paleolithic. Original sin and all that. This is why virtue is so difficult and vice is so easy and tempting.
- Philosophical modernity (liberalism), which tends to make Protestantism (and everything else) more lax.
The instability of Protestantism allows it to succumb to these forces more easily than other ideologies and religions.
Having said that, Protestantism is not the only factor here. Technological progress produces wealth that removes material obstacles to laxity.
"Modernity is the secularization of Protestantism."
How is a Baptist fundamentalist a "modern"?
Of course, he is a modern. He is not a modern compared to the woke, but he is a modern compared to a traditional Catholic or Orthodox. Modernity is a moving target, as I said.
I am not an expert about Baptism fundamentalism. So I copy from the Internet. Please, feel free to explain me about Baptism fundamentalism beliefs.
"The beliefs are mainly Baptist and fundamentalists.[8] They refuse any form of ecclesial authority other than that of the local church. "
Well, this is a modern attitude. Only modernity rejects authority and hierarchy, which is present in all societies and religions in history, with no exception. This is derived from the Lutheran idea of universal priesthood, which is secularized as "equality".
"Great emphasis is placed on the literal interpretation of the Bible as the primary method of Bible study."
Another modern attitude. Traditional views on the interpretation of the Bible were that only authorities should interpret the Bible and they could be interpreted it metaphorically (see Ireneus and Saint Augustine about the interpretation of Genesis). This is also derived from universal priesthood and Sola Scripture (which is called "relativism" in modern times: every man has his own truth).
"Baptists believe that faith is a matter between God and the individual (religious freedom). To them it means the advocacy of absolute liberty of conscience."
It couldn't get more modern than that. Individualism, liberty of conscience and religious freedom are radically modern concepts and unimaginable in non-modern societies, in any time in history and in any religion.
I guess I could go on and on.
"And what does the secularisation of Catholicism look like. Looking at some of the Pew Research figures in the U.S. the Catholics aren't exactly pushing back the secular tide."
But you are mixing three different topics.
First topic: Modernity is the secularization of Protestantism. Or, better, Protestantism is the first form of Modernity. This is a topic that is independent from the secularization of Catholicism. We were talking about Protestantism, not about Catholicism.
Second topic: What does the secularization of Catholicism looks like?
Third topic: Is Catholicism effective against secularization?
About the first topic, I have written long comments and nothing I have said has to do with Catholicism. It is a topic about the ORIGIN of modernity, not about a strategy to fight against it. My thesis is that Modernity is a byproduct of Protestantism and, even if Catholicism was Satan's work, this wouldn't change a bit my reasoning. I have not said that Catholicism or Protestantism is good or bad. I am only trying to describe the situation.
About the second topic, the secularization of Catholicism is the abandonment of Catholicism, whether totally or partially ("Cafeteria Catholicism" where you pick and choose the beliefs you want to follow). Because traditional Catholicism cannot be secularized, you have to adopt Protestant values (such as liberty of conscience) to secularize Catholicism. In fact, after Council Vatican II, Catholicism is a mixture of Protestantism and traditional Catholicism.
This won't be easy to explain. English is not my native language.
The upward mobility of the bourgeoisie doomed the Ancient Regime, where rulers were the absolute kings, the nobles and the Church. The bourgeois wanted to rule so they needed an ideology against traditional Catholicism, which favored hierarchy, the divine right of kings, the traditional customs and laws. In short, the Ancient Regime.
In the Protestant countries, it was easier. They had Sola Scriptura, so they could invent new versions of Christianity that were more in line with equality. You see an evolution to Puritan versions of Protestantism, where there were no bishops or hierarchy. This is the first form of Modernity. In "Albion's Seed: Four British Folkways in America", you see that Massachusetts Puritan were egalitarians and they reacted with horror when some nobles tried to go to Massachussetts to rule over them. Quakers are a completely modern movement.
"Quakers seek to experience God directly [...] Quakerism is a way of life, rather than a set of beliefs. It has roots in Christianity and many Quakers find the life and teachings of Jesus inspirational, but we have no creed. [...] Our inner experience leads us to be committed to equality, peace, simplicity and truth; all of which we try to live out in our lives."
It does not get more modern than that.
My point is that the flexibility of Protestantism allowed Protestant countries to abandon Christianity little by little, step by step. It was a progressive movement and not universal. Some sects secularized and abandoned Christianity, other remained closer to Christianity. So there was a split in ideology:
- Liberalism, as the secularization of Protestantism.
- Classical Protestantism, as the traditional form of Protestantism.
These two branches of the same movement influenced each other and coexisted, until Modernity moved so far away from Christianity (gay marriage) that was impossible to coexist. Then, the upper middle classe rejected Protestantism and embraced Liberalism.
Catholicism couldn't do that. It couldn't reject the dogmas, especially after the Council of Trent. So it couldn't drift away from Christianity little by little, step by step. It was all-or-nothing. So the first strategy of the Catholic Church is to resist, reject liberalism (what you call "philosophical modernity"). "Liberalism is a sin" Félix Sardà y Salvany said.
Meanwhile, revolutionaries in Catholic countries rejected completely Catholicism and adopted Liberalism from Protestant countries. So it was more traumatic in Catholic countries. The revolutionaries fought against the Church: they couldn't invent new forms of Christianity that were more and more liberal, such as in the States.
Even when revolutionaries won the political power (after the bourgeois revolutions), most people remained Catholic and they didn't secularized. When the secularization came (20th century) was an abandonment of Catholicism and a complete adoption of Liberalism (that is, secularized Protestantism). It was not a slow drifting away from the Church for centuries. The generation of the parents was Catholic and the generation of their children were not Christian at all. In Spain, this process happened during the 80s and in Ireland during the 90s. As a Spanish guy, I lived the completely Catholic society of my childhood and the completely atheistic society of today. This was fast. I lived a process that took centuries in other countries.
So Catholicism is unable to secularize in the same way Protestantism has done. To secularize Catholicism is to abandon Catholicism. Joe Biden is a Catholic Only in Name, as many Catholics. While Protestantism could secularize little by little and some sects could retain parts of traditional Christianity, because they were more flexible until a point where Modernity was so absurd and anti-Christian that this could not be done any more.
Looking at some of the Pew Research figures in the U.S. the Catholics aren't exactly pushing back the secular tide. Catholic membership hasn't made Joe Biden a paragon of traditionalism. The lion's share of "conservative pushback" is being done by the Evangelicals.
Agree with that. But this was not my point. My point is that the origin of Modernity is the secularization of Protestantism. In fact, Protestantism is the earliest form of Modernity. And this is completely unrelated. I never said that Catholicism is better than Protestantism to fight current versions of Modernity (or the other way around). I was making a historic point about the origins.
The key issue is the relationship of faith to Grace. And it's my opinion that certain strands of Protestantism are Graced. Mainline Protestantism isn't. (It may have been at one time.)
This is a matter of opinion and I don't have any bad will against Protestants, who I regard as my brethren in faith. And my text has been very long. I don't want to give my opinion, which would require to write more and more. It's enough.
It is not relativism, at all. The relativist denies the existence of objective truth, Sola Scriptura and the priesthood of all believers (which even Catholics have a version of), were never denying objective truth.
The idea that only authorities can interpret the Bible, which we know because that is what the authorities say, doesn’t entirely work. As I recall the fathers argued from the Bible a lot. The Bereans searched the scriptures to validate Paul. The idea that I need to outsource my conscience to authorities is suspect, and I also suspect not even actually Catholic. Ignorance of scripture is ignorance of Christ, I want to say Irenaeus said that. Is the idea I should read scripture and pretend not to understand any of it? I don’t think that’s Catholic either ironically.
And to make things a little clearer, one of the things that bugs me is the tendency to make arguments not from primary sources. According to some Catholic apologists, I’m capable of understanding the authorities and tradition correctly but am incapable of understanding scripture correctly. I am left, in practice but not in theory, with a fallible scripture but infallible tradition. In theory the Protestant world should be chaos, since we’re all interpreting the Bible willy nilly, but that’s really not what happened. The overwhelming majority of us believe in the creeds, the Deity of Christ, the resurrection, salvation though faith in Christ and much more. We mostly commune each other far more than you would think as well, so our vaunted disunity is over sold, and theoretically should be much worse than it is.
"one of the core problems of Protestantism is inability to self-police its limits." Tis true, as one can always just pop up another church if the one you're in doesn't say what you want. Not all Roman Catholic prophecies about the results of the Reformation were wrong. That it would multiply denominations to the nth degree was accurate as can be.
Market pressure also exacerbates the problem. Since (except in some European countries) most protestant denominations are not state funded, they rely on offerings to exist. This means that taking a hard line on something may offend some of the congregants, and send them elsewhere. The existence of the congregation can be at stake if this happens too often.
So we end up at a point where "being nice" as a core of what the church teaches. Doctrine becomes mobile, so that the people don't.
@Chent: The idea that freedom of conscience is a bad thing, or modern, is inevitably held by those Catholics who virulently hate the actual Pope and who, under an actual theocracy, would be burned alive for repeatedly insulting the “Holy Father”.
What the multiplication of denominations means though is heavily overstated. It’s not like every denomination claims it alone is the one true church and that members of other churches are unsaved heretics. The Protestant denominations have routinely, for centuries, cooperated in evangelism and other great works , frequently communed each other, etc., it hasn’t just been conflict. The “niceness” doctrine is by no means an exclusively Protestant disease but even so, the largest most thriving denominations tend towards greater and greater conservatism. The traditional Anglican communion appears to be growing, while the mainline liberal Episcopalian churches are not.
Excess cynicism about human nature had gotten us into this mess. We assume “real Christianity” is unattractive, while “fuzzy Christianity” is attractive. Whereas the reality is, if a man wants Christ it seems he often wants the “hard stuff”. This is also why TLM parishes seem to grow as well. The more liberal sort doesn’t gravitate, it seems, to liberal Christianity, but away from organized Christian religion at all.
By rights most Protestants shouldn’t be holding to the creeds, traditional biblical ethics, etc. By rights we should be more divided than we are. But we’re not.
Take away the numbers from Africa, and I don’t know that any denominations are growing. Even conservative denominations in the US are shrinking. The mainlines all went the way of niceness.
I was just using it as an example of why Protestants haven’t been able to police its limits - there’s always somewhere else to go.
Hey, I’m Lutheran, so I think we should hold to the creeds and biblical ethics. But to try and say we aren’t divided . . . uh, count the number of churches in any small town. Some of the divisions are sharper than others, but are there nevertheless.
Sorry. Have been busy the past few days.
My point is that the origin of Modernity is the secularization of Protestantism.
Disagree.
I think its more accurate to say Protestantism was prone to secularisation but it is not inherently modern. The Key features of philosophical modernity are:
a) Positivism->This is incompatible with any strand of Protestantism.
b) Negation of the normative value of the Bible. i.e. moral relativism. This is incompatible with sola scriptura
Erroneous interpretations of the Bible are certainly possible and I think that this is one of the Problems of Protestantism, but its more of an issue of various protestant denominations trying to reconcile the claims of positivism with the Bible. This results in interpretations which greatly weaken the literal meaning of the text or arrive a syncretic interpretation which contrary to the text. BTW, The French revolution,for instance, was modern without being Protestant.
As a Spanish guy, I lived the completely Catholic society of my childhood and the completely atheistic society of today.
Spain is a fascinating case of the problems of integralism. If the faith of the Spanish was "deep" modernity should haven't been a problem in Spain. If on the other hand it was a faith that was series of social conventions held up by legal sanction, it's very easy to see how it would collapse with the onslaught of modernity. The Spanish Civil war would have been impossible without a largely dechristianised Spanish Population. That's the problem.
The upward mobility of the bourgeoisie doomed the Ancient Regime,
The critique levelled against the Church in the late 19th C was that the bourgeois had allied themselves with the monarchy to keep the proletariat poor and exploited. The ancient regime was doomed by its own incompetence. The big story of the late 19th and early 20th C was the inability of most of Europe to deal with the rising proletariat.
My point is that the flexibility of Protestantism allowed Protestant countries to abandon Christianity little by little, step by step.
Protestant flexibility goes both ways. It can can swing towards liberalism but it can swing towards conservativism. In the U.S. it's the Evangelicals who are holding traditional values. In fact, they seem more traditional that the Catholics.
Meanwhile, revolutionaries in Catholic countries rejected completely Catholicism and adopted Liberalism from Protestant countries.
It was safer to be a Catholic in the U.S. or the U.K. than it was to be in socialist Spain especially during the civil war. Liberalism, within limits is not the problem.
Because traditional Catholicism cannot be secularized, you have to adopt Protestant values (such as liberty of conscience) to secularize Catholicism
Catholicism actually teaches that you have to obey your conscience even against the Church.
https://www.ewtn.com/catholicism/library/conscience-and-truth-2468
And my text has been very long.
Feel free to write. Your English is excellent and your comments are decent. I don't mind criticism if it is well thought. I understand that you mean no ill will to the Protestants but are trying to argue the process of secularisation.
@Scott
So we end up at a point where "being nice" as a core of what the church teaches.
I think the theology of "nice" is less a result of trying to gain "market share" as it is about conforming religion to social conventions. Newman, in his idea of gentleman said:
"It is almost a definition of a gentleman to say he is one who never inflicts pain…The true gentleman…carefully avoids whatever may cause a jar or a jolt in the minds of those with whom he is cast;—all clashing of opinion, or collision of feeling, all restraint, or suspicion, or gloom, or resentment; his great concern being to make every one at their ease and at home.
He has his eyes on all his company; he is tender towards the bashful, gentle towards the distant, and merciful towards the absurd; he can recollect to whom he is speaking; he guards against unseasonable allusions, or topics which may irritate; he is seldom prominent in conversation, and never wearisome. "
Well mannered Christianity is the Christianity of the upper classes.
There's a hell of a lot of truth to this clip.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-4IletJ7-Tw
@Hoyos
By rights most Protestants shouldn’t be holding to the creeds, traditional biblical ethics, etc. By rights we should be more divided than we are. But we’re not.
I think the mistake most people make is assuming Protestantism eventually degenerates into Liberalism. As I see it, Protestantism can go both ways. However, I think that the Liberal/Conservative divide with Protestantism is now so wide now that they are essentially practically different religions. There is some unity in theory but far less in practice.
People who read the Bible through a literal or subjective interpretation are going to come to different results as to what the Bible teaches. I think historically, people interpreted the Bible more or less literally but as time moved on the bible was interpreted through various other lenses to give "different readings" some of which seem to repudiate literal biblical texts.
"I think the theology of "nice" is less a result of trying to gain "market share" as it is about conforming religion to social conventions."
True, it def is aimed at conforming to social conventions. But I also think that, while "missions" and gaining market share may be a stated goal, what is more often going on is trying not to lose who is already there. Every one who gets mad at a church's stance on sexual ethic, communion policy, non-universalism, etc - the easier route for a pastor to take is to not make a big deal about any of those doctrines or practices.
Again, all churches in the West are losing people, with pastors and bishops are getting the blame (they're in charge, right?). Some have pointed out the demographic realities of not having children - this is not received well by many (namely, Boomers - who still run a lot of things). The response is often that we need to be more "loving," "winsome," not so "dogmatic," etc. Which is equal to saying, "Be nicer."
From an inside Protestantism view, liberal and conservative Protestants aren’t “almost” different religions, conservative Protestants view truly liberal (theologically speaking, as in denying the Deity of Christ, etc.) Protestants as not even Christian at all. Words like heretic and apostate receive heavy usage and aren’t spoken ironically.
Again I want to say I appreciate your attempts to understand Protestantism and your analysis of it is fair. Much Catholic treatment of Protestantism is the Catholic equivalent of “You guys worship Mary!”. Protestantism may be thought wrong but it can’t be casually hand waived, like it’s just oh so obvious.
And as much as I don’t like using the labels as a Protestant I am continually frustrated by Catholics getting key facts of Protestantism wrong. If Protestantism is wrong I want real strong arguments against it, truly, because this type of thing is too important to not be taken seriously.
@Scott
Which is equal to saying, "Be nicer."
Yes, there's definitely an element of truth to that.
@Hoyos
Much Catholic treatment of Protestantism is the Catholic equivalent of “You guys worship Mary!”.
Agree.
Doc,
To what extent was late 19th and early 20th century UMC and UC adherence to Protestantism simply utilitarian? I mean the realization by the intelligent classes that these sorts of values are necessary for a good and stable society and even for its very existence.
You see this among some of the intellectual, far-right blogosphere. There's far less hostility and even some degree of utilitarian embrace of traditional Christianity among the type of folks who maybe a generation ago blamed Christianity and were either proud atheists or pagan LARP-ers.
@Bruce
To what extent was late 19th and early 20th century UMC and UC adherence to Protestantism simply utilitarian? I
The impression I get is that most of it was quite sincere. There is a good "tradition" among the French atheists to see the important "social role" of religion despite not believing in it. Comte actually built temples for "atheism" on the basis that the public order was served by having a "religion" of some kind.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Church_of_Humanity
Even the French Revolutionaries tried to create a substitute. Charles Murras was famous for upholiding French Catholicism while personally despising it.
I'm not really aware of any similar line among the Protestants, though the above article mentions some Anglosphere adherents.
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